Wish I could go back in time and give these to me:

 

 

 

 

 

Little Hurricane was on a roll this morning!

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I’m picking my battles, Don’t judge me

“Pick your battles.  Your child insists on wearing a t-shirt and shorts in December?  He’s the one who’ll be cold, not you.  Save it for something important.”

That wise advice came to me from my kids’ pediatrician before my first child was even born.  I was only 19 at the time and that conversation has stayed with me.  I can’t even begin to count how many times I’ve been in the midst of “fighting” over something with one of my kids when I’ll remember “…save it for something important.”

Ironically enough, most of my battles HAVE in fact been fought over wearing clothes.  It’s already been well established that CamCam HATES wearing clothes.  I really though he’d grow out of this by now, but I still have a streaker in the house. 

You can’t even begin to imagine the battle that ensues when we need to leave the house.  We live in New England, it’s December, it’s ridiculously cold outside.  But CamCam still cannot see why he needs to get dressed to go out. 

And then there’s the coat.

Ohhhhh, the coat.  Why does he hate his coat so?  I let him pick it out himself, I foolishly thought this would help.  But apparently a coat is an evil burden CamCam wants no part of. “I don’t need my coat ma, I’m fine,” he says when we’re leaving the house.    In the van he will not get into his car seat until his coat is off.  Once we get to our destination, I get to stand outside in below freezing temperatures trying to get CamCam to understand why he now needs to put on his coat.   Often I have to force him to wear it.  We barely step inside the door of wherever we are going when CamCam abruptly stops, unzips his coat, and throws it into the stroller in disgust. 

The other night I had to stop at 3 separate places.  Once to get into the car, 3 times to get into 3 buildings, 3 times to leave 3 buildings- that equals 7 times I had to fight with CamCam about wearing his coat.  As we were leaving the final building I told him to wait, we needed to put on his coat.  He laughed and ran for the door.  Little Miss caught up to him and CamCam started crying and falling to the floor, “I don’t wanna coat, I don’t wanna coat….”

The advice I got from the pediatrician so long ago came back to me.  I said to Little Miss, “Never mind, just forget it.  One of two things will happen, either he’ll be cold and realize how foolish he is, or he actually is too hot and he’ll be happy.” 

We went outside and CamCam was so happy.  He was skipping along, singing, jumping off of steps.  He was free. 

I was smiling.

And then a couple came out of the store behind me, and I heard the women turn to her husband and say:

      “That boy really should have a coat on.”

What Was He Thinking?!?

I would LOVE it if I could, just once, understand my kid’s thought process.  How often I shake my head and say “What were you thinking?”  

“Were you thinking???”

Just the other day CamCam and Nolie were downstairs playing.  I heard CamCam cry, so I went to see what was up.  CamCam was standing at the bottom of the stairs, Nolie was hiding (definite guilty move!) and CamCam’s face was covered in a black sorta haze.  My paranoid prone brain naturally went to every worst case scenario that could have produced crying AND a black face. 

“What happened to you?”  No answer.

“What did Nolie do?”  No answer

“What’s happened to your face?!?!”  That’s when Nolie saw his chance.  He knew he’d be in trouble with the first two questions, but on this one he was scott-free.  He came bouncing out of hiding and exclaimed “CamCam ate the stamps!”

Apparently my boys were playing with stamps, and CamCam decided to lick the inkpad. 

“What were you thinking?  Why on earth would you lick the inkpad?!?”

Naturally, he had a perfectly logical explanation:  “Because, I was playing basketball and so then I ate the black.”

Well, logical to him anyways. 

I really wish I could say they grow out of this.  But, alas, experience has taught me that this is not so.

Last year, when my oldest son was 12, I went into his room and saw that his comforter had a big hole in it.

 

“What did you do to your comforter???”
”Nothing, it ripped.”
”There’s no way that it ripped like that.”
”Yes it did.”
”You seriously expect me to believe that it ripped in a perfect square.”
    silence
”Did you cut it?”
”Yeah.”
”Why did you cut it?”
”I spilled lemonade.”
(trying to wrap my brain around that one)”So why would you cut it if you spilled lemonade on it, I can just wash it.”
”No, I didn’t spill lemonade on it, I spilled it on the shelf here.”
(trying not to scream) ”I don’t get it.”
”I didn’t have any towels to wipe it up with.”
”So you thought cutting your comforter was the best idea?!?”
”What else was I supposed to do?”

I have a feeling that once they’re teenagers, it only gets worse.

House Cleaning Strike

You know what I don’t want to do anymore?  Clean my house. 

Nope.

Had enough.

I hear many moms say it’s a never-ending battle.  And guess what?  It really is a never-ending battle. 

At any given moment I have enough laundry thrown around the house to open my own Gap store.  And everyday I pick it up.  How is that even possible?  I know there’s seven people living here, but come on!  No one's changing clothes 10 times a day, where is all the laundry coming from?  Heck, CamCam won’t even wear clothes.  Is someone throwing it out of the closets when I’m not looking?  Something fishy is definitely going on here. 

And dust.  I think all the world’s dust originates at my house.  Yup.  Right here is the source.  Sorry people.  It doesn’t matter how often you dust, soon as you turn around, it’s right back.  It’s like some sort of evil monster. 

Ohhhh, fingerprints.  I have fingerprints all over the windows, furniture and kitchen appliances.  Except, my kids have Indestructible Fingerprints.  No matter what cleaning product I buy, I can’t get them off.  I actually wiped some of the finish off our end table, but the fingerprints wouldn’t budge. 

Mopping is a joke.  All I do when I mop is guarantee that soon after someone will have an accident.  Maybe someone can’t make it to the bathroom.  Maybe someone decides to throw a plate of food across the room.  Or maybe someone decides their old enough to get their own glass of apple juice and then, oops, when they spill the entire bottle decide they better use every towel they can find to smear the stuff across the room.  

How about picking up?  Anyone still bother to try and pick up toys and things that are where they do not belong?  I read this cleaning tip once- it said to take a laundry basket with you throughout your house and anything you find that isn’t where it belongs, toss it into the basket.  Hahaha, one laundry basket!  Could anyone accomplish this with one?  I think I’d need at least 10.

But seriously, if I really put my mind to it and decided that this was it, I was going to go right now and not stop until I had the entire house in tip-top shape, I bet I could get the whole thing done in less then 3 hours.   

I could do it.

And my three little boys, if they really put their mind to it and decided to go right after and not stop until they had messed up everything I did, I bet they would be done in less than 3 minutes. 

They have done it.

I hope I’m not asking for too much, but. . .

I think I need a break.

One week would be nice.  One week away on vacation somewhere warm and I could have a week off from doing laundry.  Ahhhh, that would be great.

Although a week off from laundry probably isn’t possible.  What would everyone wear?

6 Days then.  I’d like 6 days off from cleaning the house.  No vacuuming, no dusting- how awesome would that be?

Of course, no one would be cleaning in those 6 days, so I’d just have a lot of catching up to do.  6 days break is asking too much.

5 Days- for 5 days I would love it if the kids would stop fighting.  No pushing someone because they took your toy, no rough-housing resulting in tears.  It would be so quiet here.

But how would I stop them from fighting?  Sure, Little Miss is fine, but it’s in boy’s blood to fight- I don’t think it’s possible to contain it. 

So 4 Days it is.  For 4 days I don’t want to have to clean up from a single meal.  No highchair trays dumped to the floor to signal “I’m Done!”, no peanut butter sandwiches turned into table art, no more spaghetti sauce in hair. 

I think that’s asking the impossible though.  NO way that could ever happen.

How about 3 days?  A long weekend- maybe The Dada and I could go away for a long weekend and just relax.  Marvelous.

Except that I know the minute I leave the house I’d miss my kiddos too much and I wouldn’t enjoy myself at all the entire time.

So a long weekend away is expecting too much of me.  How about 2 days?  For 2 days I’d love it if I didn’t have to pick up a single toy.  No rooms looking like a hurricane or tornado just went through them.

Of course I DO have a little hurricane and tornado living in my home. 

So one day.  For one day could no one please ask me for food?  No more eating full meals and then 15 minutes later crying to me about how hungry your tummy is.  No hanging on cupboard doors wailing about how you need to “eat, eat, eaaaattttt!”  No opening the fridge door and climbing up inside. 

But that’s never going to happen, I have a house full of boys.  Endless guts.

So maybe just a few hours?  Could I have a few hours to maybe work on “The baby’s” scrapbook?

Fancy paper, markers, nifty scissors, glue, stamps and endless piles of stickers- what on earth am I thinking asking my little boys to stay away from that tempting spread???

Ok, so if a few hours is too much, how about a minute?  If I could just have one minute to run upstairs and use the bathroom without “Little Hurricane” pushing a bar stool over to the kitchen sink, climbing up the stool and onto the counter, then crawling into the kitchen sink and drinking the old liquids out of the dishes sitting in there; if I could just do that- it would be the best thing ever. 

Lost in Translation

What is wrong with the filter in our boy’s brains?  I know they are hearing what I say, but there must be something wrong with the connection between their ear and their brain that takes what I say, and turns it into the complete opposite.  And it’s not just one of my boys.  Nope, it’s all four.  So it definitely has to be a “boy thing”. 

I even think The Dada suffers from this.

I’m in the entry, putting on the boys coats and shoes as quickly as possible because we are running late for a doctor’s appointment.  I get “Mr. Trouble’s” stuff on him.

I say:  Ok, go out to the van and quickly buckle yourself in.  We are late so please go right into your seat.

He hears:  Go outside and run around to the back of the house.  Try and hide and when I come looking for you, run away and hide somewhere else.  Keep this up until we are REALLY late. 

I’m upstairs putting away laundry that has gathered outside the bedroom doors.  I’m in the boys room and CamCam comes up to me with a pile of his sister’s clothes.

He says: Here ya go ma.

I say: Thanks CamCam,  but these are your sister’s, they don’t go in here. The Baby’s sleeping in there though, so just put them back on the floor. 

He hears:  These are your sister’s.  Open her door and put them in her room, preferably as loudly as possible. 

We are out in public and Nolie and CamCam run off from me as we are leaving a building.  CamCam runs outside and takes off.  When we get into the van, I give the boys a stern talk about listening and safety.

I say:  You boys have got to start listening to me.  I’ve told you over and over that you have to stay next to me when we are out.  It isn’t safe when you run off.  But you don’t listen to me and that’s why we don’t get to do fun things like go to Chuckie Cheese and go to the playground.  When you start listening and being safe, then we can do more of these fun things.

CamCam hears:  We’re going to the playground!

The older two have been home from school for a half-hour and I am letting them know what their chores are. 

To my oldest I say:  You need to put your clean laundry away.  Please make sure you do not just throw it all in one drawer, you need to put everything away in the correct drawers.  I’ve even laid it out according to which drawer it goes in for you so there’s no excuse.

He hears:  Grab the 4 piles of clean laundry in one massive swoop and dump everything into the bottom drawer of my dresser.  If it topples over, grab whatever fell onto the floor, open the top drawer, and shove it into that.  Now, granted, only the middle drawer is staying closed, but 1 out of 3 isn’t half-bad. 

It’s getting close to dinner time, and I’m in the kitchen trying to finish up as quickly as possible.

I say:  Alright everyone, you gotta get out of here.  I know you’re all hungry and I’m going as fast as I can, but I cannot cook like this. 

They hear:  Mom can’t finish cooking unless The Baby is standing between her legs, hanging onto them and crying, Nolie and CamCam are running around her hitting each other, LaLa is looking in all the pots and asking if he can “just have cereal to eat.” 

The little boys have all been tucked into bed.  I’m in Nolie and CamCam’s room.

I say:  Ok boys, now it’s time to go to sleep.  I read you your book, everyone’s gone potty, you have your drinks right here.  There is no reason for you to get up.  I don’t want any talking or fooling around, it’s time for sleeping.

They hear:  Ok boys, it’s now time to act like caged animals.  I want to hear banging on the walls, throwing of toys, and LOTS of laughing.  Hopefully loud enough to wake The Baby. Tear apart your room.   And, I can think of at least 6 different things you could come out of your room to ask for.  Whatever you do- do not go to sleep. 

Messy Eaters

One of the coolest things about having lots of kids is how in one glance you can see the progression with each age.  The other day all four of my boys were sitting next to each other on the couch, and just so happened to be sitting according to age.  Their heads looked like a set of stairs, it made The Dada and me chuckle.  Anytime I’m doing an art activity with my three little guys, it quickly becomes apparent the amount of growth that occurs year to year. 

And then there’s eating.  Some nights I wonder when I’m going to be free of washing messy little hands and faces.  The other night we were eating spaghetti and I realized that this will happen sometime between the ages of 5 and 13.

The messiness of boys eating, according to age:

Age 13.  Perfectly clean, as I’d expect.

 

Age 5.  Little sauce on the cheeks, nothing awful.

 

Age 3.  Oh yeah, that’s more like it. 
Face, tummy, hands… nice. 

20 Months.  Maybe next time I’ll spoon-feed him.

He sure was enjoying this meal.

 

That explains how he gets it in his hair!

Hmmm, it might just be easier to trade in for a new,
clean baby. 

Now their rooms, that’s a funny thing.  If I were to take a picture of their rooms, the mess would go in the exact opposite direction.